Thursday, December 16, 2021

DisChem's Vaccine Lies

I'm tired of all the lies and propaganda about the COVID-19 vaccines in South Africa. So now it's time to call out the unscientific rubbish being published by people who should know better. This poster by Dis-Chem ("pharmacists who care") is a perfectly good example. They claim they got the information from COVIDComms SA, but even a few fact checks on Google would show how bogus this information is. That's how much they care. As long as they sell plenty of vaccine doses, what's a few white lies among friends?

1. Tested Twice

Vaccines are tested and approved internationally and in South Africa before they are given to people.
Oversimplified and misleading. There are two ongoing trials of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, one sponsored by BioNTech in Germany (Phase 1), and another sponsored by BioNTech(Pfizer) in the USA, Argentina, Brazil, Turkey, South Africa and Germany (Phase 1,2,3). Not all phases are completed. None of the trials are independent, and the trial data is not available for public scrutiny. So, we have to rely on the honesty of the manufacturer to provide accurate data. The animal trials failed, so all of these trials are given to the trial participants (people) before they are given to the general public (also people). There were 771 people in phase 1, and 87,495 people in phases 2 and 3. [1]. No "Vaccine safety" information provided.

2. New Technologies

New technologies and information about other Coronaviruses before COVID-19 made production faster.
Vague and misleading. Presumably it is referring to the fact that these are mRNA vaccines. The mRNA technology hasn't been successful in any previous attempts at a vaccine. The manufacturers of the vaccine are immune from prosecution for any side effects, manufacturing defects, quality control lapses, or incorrect administration of the doses. For example, in the first 90 days after approval of the vaccine in the USA, 7 people died due to incorrect administration or dosing out of 2792 reported "Medication Error" events. Administration had not even started in South Africa at that point. [2:Page 26]. Again, no "vaccine safety" information, just talk about faster production and new technologies.

3. Over One Million Volunteers

Over one million volunteers were part of the testing process for the vaccine - 2 000 South Africans tested the vaccine.
Wrong. NIAID was looking for a million volunteers [3:July 2020] but the Pfizer trial involved 90,000 people at best (see above), and it doesn't say how many South Africans were involved. The Johnson & Johnson trial involved 2,000 participants in South Africa [4], but presumably half of them were in the control group, so they didn't "test" anything. Again, no mention of the safety of the trials.

4. Millions Are Vaccinated

Over 700 million people around the world are already fully vaccinated.
Again, misleading. It implies that 700 million people were safely vaccinated, but avoids actually saying that. The real situation is being carefully concealed and manipulated by the drug companies, the "health" authorities, and many doctors (and pharmacists who care). [5] If you are convinced that the vaccine is "safe and effective" then what do you say when a patient dies within 48 hours of taking the vaccine? Who is going to pay for the autopsy? So the doctor says, "it's a coincidence" and doesn't mention the vaccine as cause of death. It happened to a family friend. They are too busy grieving to worry about the doctor's lies. So if you hear that millions are vaccinated but don't hear about the side effects and fatalities, does that mean the vaccine is safe?

5. Side Effects Are Tracked

Vaccines may have some side effects. All vaccine side effects are monitored over time.
Once again, this is false and misleading. It implies that "someone" is actively monitoring for vaccine side effects and injuries. Pfizer isn't doing it, and they admit as much. They are passively accepting data sent to them. This data has to be forced out of the FDA by a court order [6] after they sat on the data for months, and claimed it would take years to be released, despite their legal obligation to do so in a timeous fashion.
So what are the known side effects? For the first 90 days of the Pfizer vaccine, there was a total of 42,086 case reports (25,379 medically confirmed and 16,707 non-medically confirmed) containing 158,893 events. Most cases (34,762) were received from United States (13,739), United Kingdom (13,404) Italy (2,578), Germany (1913), France (1506), Portugal (866) and Spain (756); the remaining 7,324 were distributed among 56 other countries. The Pfizer report [2:Page 7] lists 1,223 fatalities out of those 42,086 reports. The report also lists:
  • Nervous system disorders (25,957)
  • Musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders (17,283)
  • Gastrointestinal disorders (14,096)
  • Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders (8,476)
  • Respiratory, thoracic and mediastinal disorders (8,848)
  • Infections and infestations (4,610)
  • Injury, poisoning and procedural complications (5,590)
  • Investigations (3,693)
There is no mention whatsoever of menstrual cycle issues [7]. They are not even listed in the conditions tracked. British women have made 30,304 reports of changes to their periods after having received a Covid vaccine. So much for the official data from the manufacturer. Remember Thalidomide? The manufacturer's data said it was perfectly safe. Except when it wasn't.
How bad is 1,223 fatalities? Considering that the common vaccines (Polio; MMR: Measles, Mumps, Rubella; Tetanus; Rabies; etc) have reports of less than a dozen or so over the entire history of each vaccine, it would appear that the COVID-19 is TEN times more deadly than all the other common vaccines combined. Yet this "safety" information is not mentioned.

6. Protects Against Serious Illness

You can still get COVID-19 but the vaccine protects from serious illness and death.
Where is the data? Most countries with high vaccination rates are still experiencing high death tolls and hospitalization rates. Most media reports try to spin this as "the unvaccinated" are getting sick, but the reality is quite different. One study shows that "Increases in COVID-19 are unrelated to levels of vaccination across 68 countries and 2947 counties in the United States" [8]. Public officials are promoting "booster shots" as being necessary because the vaccine's "protection" only seems to last about 6 months. So I guess the death of 1,223 people in 90 days is not a serious death.

7. Check for Side Effects

In the days after your jab, check your body for side effects like tiredness, soreness, headache, fever, dry cough, etc.
All of the mentioned side effects are also listed as symptoms of a COVID-19 infection. That's because the vaccine generates the same toxic spike protein found in SARS-Cov-2. But the vaccine generates these toxic proteins in an unregulated way. Notice that none of the serious side effects listed above are included. This is deliberately misleading.
Nor does the poster mention the risk of Anaphylactic shock, which is the reason why one has to wait for 15 minutes after the injection, to see if Anaphylaxis shows up. The Pfizer report [2:Page 10] lists the following under the heading of Anaphylaxis:
  • Relevant event seriousness: Serious (2341), Non-Serious (617);
  • Gender: Females (876), Males (106), Unknown (20);
  • Age (n=961) ranged from 16 to 98 years (mean = 54.8 years, median = 42.5 years);
  • Relevant event outcomes: fatal (9), resolved/resolving (1922), not resolved (229), resolved with sequelae [complications] (48), unknown (754).
No, I don't know why there were 2341 serious cases but only 961 people involved. Seems fishy to me too. So the "ten things you need to know about COVID-19 vaccine safety" poster obviously doesn't think you need to know about any of the real risks. Just puppy dogs and kittens.

8. Works in Two Weeks

The vaccine will take two weeks before it gives protection against COVID-19.
Again, what is NOT said is more important than what is said. During those two weeks your immune system is temporarily compromised as it deals with the unregulated production of the toxic spike protein. So any conditions that you may have had in the past that were being suppressed by your immune system can flare up again. Also, you could get flu, COVID-19 or any other contagious disease if exposed to it during that period, and your body will probably battle to deal with both at the same time. But in many regions you aren't classified as "vaccinated" until after the two week window, so any problems that occur during that time may well be recorded as occurring in "unvaccinated" patients. That's how the data is skewed. Here is the CDC definition: "For the purposes of this guidance, people are considered fully vaccinated for COVID-19 ≥2 weeks after they have received the second dose in a 2-dose series (Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna), or ≥2 weeks after they have received a single-dose vaccine (Johnson and Johnson) ... Unvaccinated people refers to individuals of all ages, including children, that have not completed a vaccination series or received a single-dose vaccine." [9]. Again, no safety data, just a bland statement that the vaccine works (assuming you survive the two weeks).

9. Stay Safe

You can spread COVID-19 to people not vaccinated. Wear your mask. Sanitize. Social Distance.
What? Let's unpack this a bit more: since you are presumably vaccinated, you got COVID-19, which means you can catch it from people who are vaccinated, and likewise spread it to people who are vaccinated. So why only mention people who are not vaccinated? This is blatantly dishonest from the "pharmacists who care".
The other "stay safe" advice applies to both vaccinated and unvaccinated, which implies that the vaccine doesn't work. After all, a vaccine that would allow us to "return to normal" would be one that prevents infection and transmission, not one that supposedly prevents hospitalization and death. Except it doesn't do that either, it only reduces hospitalization and death, and only for a limited time, hence the need for "boosters".
Once again, what is NOT said is most interesting in a poster about "public health": no mention of safe, effective early treatment, or the need to get fit, lose weight, avoid processed food, stop smoking and excessive drinking, take Vitamin C and D, and Zinc, Selenium and Quercetin. Since Dis-Chem sells these supplements, one would expect the "pharmacists who care" to mention these things, but they don't. They are the same pharmacists who sell (unhealthy) sweets and chocolates in the "gauntlet" aisle that you have to stand in while waiting for a teller. Because they care. About the bottom line, not your health.

10. Tell Your Family and Friends

Tell your friends and family about your experience and encourage them to get vaccinated.
Yes, I got suckered by this one. I told my community that I didn't experience any bad side effects, just tiredness and a sore arm. I learnt back from my community that one person had a stroke, and another suffered pericarditis. My brother told me about a friend who had a bad reaction within 24 hours, went to hospital, and died within 48 hours. Of course, it had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the vaccine. Because the doctor said it was so. People just drop dead all the time for no reason. My niece's husband who isn't even 30 has been having heart palpitations. It was unusual in his age group until the pandemic came along.
Accoring to Discovery CEO Adrian Gore, "... our own data mirrors the international research, proving Covid-19 vaccines to be extremely safe. Fewer than one in every 20 Discovery members who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine showed any signs of side effects within seven days of vaccination, and almost all were mild and resolved quickly." [10] So <5% got side effects, but he won't say how many were serious. That smells like spin to me. I don't feel reassured at all.

So what should we make of the lies and disinformation in a single poster? It seems to me that the "Vaccine uber alles" brigade will go to any lengths to "nudge" people to get a vaccine that is ineffective at best (the pandemic isn't over in countries with high vaccination rates) and dangerous at worst. The mRNA vaccine manufactures toxic spike proteins in the body in an unregulated manner, so they can spread around the body and cause havoc with just about every part of the human body. What could possibly go wrong?

Update 17 December: Unvaccinated employees must get vaccinated or be subjected to weekly tests, at their own expense. And they must wear expensive N95 masks. Dr Verwoerd would have been so proud of this version of #VaccineApartheid.
And in a cruel twist, Dis-Chem doesn't sell the N95 masks their staff are expected to wear. Because they are the pharmacists who care.
Update 18 December: I found some expensive "Civilian KN95" masks at one of their stores (but not online).
It isn't clear if they are genuine or bogus [11] or whether management is clear about the difference between N95 and KN95 masks [12] but the SA Medical Journal reports "KN95 filtering facepiece respirators distributed in South Africa fail safety testing protocols" [13], so they probably don't meet the requirements of the Vaccine Apartheid letter of 6 December. Was the "N95" requirement a typo, or a deliberate setup to be able to fire staff? Time will tell.
The "KN95" masks cost R7.50 each, but the ones that most of their staff are currently wearing are cheaper, around R2 each. All of these masks use the idiotic loops around the ears, which means they don't fit properly, obvious by the way the pharmacists (who care) and other staff were wearing them.

I could only find one mask that doesn't use the ear loops (R70), but instead has ties that you can use to tie behind your head, like the ones that surgeons use. Pathetic.

Update 14 January 2022: DisChem has managed to get itself on the red list and face a consumer boycott. And then there's this:
The human rights attorney Schalk van der Merwe posted this image on his Facebook page. He is also on LinkedIn. It isn't clear whether he is suing DisChem or not.

Update November 2022: Last year they lied about the vaccine. This year their board turned racist and announced they would no longer be hiring any new "whites" to meet their racist "diversity targets". The most glaringly non-diverse part of their organisation is the senior management, whose 5 male "executive directors" seem to be exclusively "white", and their 5 "non-executive directors" aren't. I wonder whether these "non-executive" directors really have any say in the running of the company, or whether they just feel they are token appointments, based soleley on the colour of their skin. So now their new motto should be: "Dis-Chem: pharmacists who care; management that doesn't."

Monday, August 09, 2021

LastPass is Broken. Seriously Broken

Irony
I have used and recommended LastPass for years. It has allowed me to create random passwords for a gazillion websites that I have used or visited over the years. But I no longer wish to pay for the service: I have found the open source BitWarden product instead. I migrated all my passwords to BitWarden, and it seems to work just as well.
It seems, however, that LastPass just doesn't want to say goodbye. No matter what I do, I can't delete my account. And they don't make it easy, either. First, you have to find the part of the website that "enables" you to delete the account.
Log in to your LastPass account and click on "Account Settings" at the bottom left. Then scroll down to "Account Information" and click on the "My Account" link.
Don't waste your time trying to cancel your PayPal recurring payment. There isn't one. LastPass stopped using PayPal, but hasn't updated its website to reflect this. Nor has it informed its customers. So, you will be sent on a wild goose chase at PayPal that will only waste your time and achieve nothing. #Strike1
Rather, click on the button to "Delete or Reset Account".
I suggest you export all your data and click on the "Reset" button. This ensures that you no longer have any passwords stored on the LastPass servers. At least that part works.
Now let's try deleting the account. Click on the "Delete" button.
You should get this fancy dialog box. Click on "Yes" because, actually, we do remember the LastPass master password. How else would we have been able to log in if we didn't?
This dialog box is broken. Presumably it would ask me to type in the master password, or something. I have no idea. #Strike2
Go back to the delete button and answer "No" to the question about remembering the master password. Let's see if that works. Click on the "Send Email" button, just to waste your time. #Strike3
OK, so now you look in your mailbox for the message from LastPass. If you are using Gmail, it's in the "Updates" section of your inbox.
So despite being told to "never click on an email link", we have to click on the email link in the message, which takes us to the following page:
Notice that we didn't have to log in to get here because we don't know our master password, remember? Fortunately, the link does expire after a while. There are supposed to be some buttons and other confirmation goodies on this page, but they aren't there. #Strike4.
So, I contacted the LastPass "help" desk. No help whatsoever. They asked me to try various things, all of which are mentioned above. #Strike5.
The Twitter account ignored my case number and told me to try various things, which didn't help. The link to their "help" mentions buttons that do not appear on the screen.
So far I have tried the following browsers:
  • Internet Explorer 11. No extensions or add-ons
  • Google Chrome, including Incognito mode, with all extensions disabled.
  • Firefox, including private browsing, with all extensions disabled.
  • Microsoft Edge, with no extensions.
I'm running out of options here.
I guess I'll have to wait until my "membership" comes up for renewal and see what happens then.

Update Tuesday 10th August: I tried posting in the LastPass "Community Forum" with some interesting results:
  • The link to this blog article was deleted. #Strike6
  • My question about "Does LastPass have ties to China?" (from the GRC forums) was deleted completely from my LastPass forum post. I'll take that as a "yes".
I asked a simple question:
"Why can't you guys just use basic HTML that is guaranteed to work on all browsers? Clearly this super-sensitive, entirely vulnerable, overly engineered JavaScript spread out over several modules doesn't work."
Let's see if we get a coherent answer.

Update 2: Apparently this is the screen I'm supposed to get:
I decided to try downloading a VirtualBox image from Microsoft that contains just Windows 7 Enterprise Edition and Internet Explorer 11. It only works for 90 days and is designed for web developers to test their websites.
After setting the DNS servers to 1.1.1.1 and 8.8.8.8 in the network settings, I ventured to the lastpass.com page and got the same result as before. This time I was using the default settings for IE 11 as recommended by Microsoft.
I also tried downloading and installing Firefox, and got exactly the same result with their default settings.
This is the Brave browser, again using default settings.
Here is Google Chrome, using default settings.
Finally, Microsoft Edge for Windows 7. It must be Windows 7 that is faulty. So let's try the Microsoft VirtualBox image with MSEdge and Windows 10.
The original Microsoft Edge browser with default settings.
The new Microsoft Edge browser with default settings.
The creaky old Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 browser with default settings.
So if it isn't the choice of browser, or the choice of Windows version, maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with the lastpass.com website? I'm pretty sure the LastPass "help" centre is connecting to another version of lastpass.com, probably the one on their Intranet.
It seems that I'm not the only one who has had this problem.

Update Wednesday 11 August: Remember my trace route (image above)? Well, I got this illuminating response:
Thanks, Glenn, for disregarding possibly helpful technical information. My confidence in your organisation has grown in leaps and bounds. #Strike7
Remember the definition of insanity? Repeating the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Well, the LastPass "Support" team seems to think that if they give you instructions that didn't work the first time, they will somehow work the next time. Maybe they just aren't saying it loudly enough.
Or if they say something completely incomprehensible, it will somehow make the problem go away:
See if you can figure out what this means. I have no idea.
On a different note, it now turns out that I need to cancel my subscription with PayPal. I have already pointed out that I can't do that because the instructions provided no longer work. So now I have to give them screenshots to show how it doesn't work.
As you can see, there is no "Yes" button to click on.
So now we have some instructions that haven't worked since 2018, but let's try them anyway.
Step 1 and 2 still work: I can click on the gear icon. I can find the "Payments" section, but nothing about "Pre-approved payments" and only one active subscription (Patreon).
I found two LogMeIn entries under "Inactive" but there is no "Cancel" button. #Strike8 Now I know what the pilots in Catch 22 felt like.

Update Thursday 12 August: Eventually, the desired result:
I tried logging in, and it rejected my login. Yay!
It has only taken two weeks to get them to cancel the account. Now I need to go through the same process for my wife's LastPass account.